


a name i'd never chosen

by incoffeespoons



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Vague discussion of death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-26
Updated: 2012-07-26
Packaged: 2017-11-10 19:36:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/469902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/incoffeespoons/pseuds/incoffeespoons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Bruce and Tony discuss how similar they may or may not be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a name i'd never chosen

"It's not the same."

Bruce sat back in the chair. A cloying disappointment wrapped around his throat. Sometimes you said words, words you meant to be unconnected - a singular statement, something to be taken on its own, as out of context as spoken words could possibly be - yet on their release you realised they could quite easily fit into a pattern. They looked the same and sounded the same as other words with other meanings. And although Bruce had meant 'it', he could see now that 'it' could easily be interpreted as 'we'. We are not the same. 

It was night, but not really dark, as such. Orange-navy sky hugged Stark Tower like a blanket on a bed. Bruce had a glass of water in his hands and he kept sipping from it even though he wasn't thirsty. Something to do. A barrier, kind of. Some days he wanted barriers and obstacles and others he didn't and on the days where did, it was inconceivable that the latter situation was ever something that existed outside of his head. So he sipped his water (Tony had put ice cubes in it, so the supply never freaking ended - infinite water, an infinite wall) and tried to pretend he was fascinated by the TV when Tony tried to talk to him. Which he did, of course. Incessantly. Usually Bruce split the burden with Pepper, but she'd flown out a couple of hours ago. She was the last remaining receptacle of conversation between Bruce and the total, full, terrifying attention of Tony Stark. 

"It's not the same," said Bruce, because when he was in a bad sort of mood he couldn't be bothered to formulate words that weren't cliches. "You're just not...it's different. Let's watch the show."

"You couldn't care less about the show," said Tony, his voice sort of whiny. He clicked his fingers and the TV screen turned black. Bruce turned to him, full of half-hearted protest, and Tony looked down for a second, a semaphore of apology. "Sorry. Overzealous. But listen to me." 

"You don't want to talk about this with me."

"Yeah, Bruce, you're right. Remember just a few seconds ago? When I said, Let's watch the show? Shut up and let me watch the TV, Bruce."

The way Tony used his name when he was annoyed reminded Bruce of a child trying to hold the attention of a distracted parent. Dad, look at me! Look, Dad. He leant forward, put his face in his hands for a second. Rubbed at his eyes. Sat up again, because pretending, like begging for attention, was for children. He picked up his glass of water from the glass table where he had set it, and looked at Tony, imploring him to continue. 

"It's more similar than you think," began Tony. Unconsciously or not, he reached up with one hand, scratching lightly on his chest, just above the reactor. "Not the tech, obviously, I don't mean that. It's like people don't think about having control over their bodies - they don't think it's something they have to work for. They just accept it. But us, we have to work and put in effort. And whatever you think, it pays off. It's like exercising. Works up a muscle that most people don't even have."

"You don't hurt people, though. That 'control' thing. You're...pretty okay with that, in the first place."

"I am pretty okay with control? That's something you're gonna say?" Tony raised his eyebrows. His voice was lighter now, which Bruce preferred, because his friend's lapses into seriousness sometimes made him feel like Tony was deliberately trying on a costume of sombreness simply to relate to him. And that was bad. That was horrible. "For a while, okay," said Tony, conspiratorial again, "I thought that this thing would kill me. I thought that what this thing made me do would kill me. And I was actually alright with that. The idea that you're still stuck feeling like that is shitty, you know."

"It would kill you? What?"

They were talking over each other now, voices overlapped like waves. Bruce could feel his jaw clenching. He remembered that time he went a year with a permanent headache from keeping his teeth ground together in his sleep, the way you couldn't prise apart feelings inside your brain and inside your body. They would always find a way to impinge on each other. 

"Just a few kinks that had to be worked out," said Tony, and this time it was definitely deliberate; he pressed against the thin, quiet light emanating through his shirt from the reactor. "All fine now. All good. That's what I'm saying. It's the same."

Bruce glanced up at the television, fixed to the wall. Then, testingly, he clicked his fingers. The screen remained black. Tony was staring at him with anger clear in the set of his jaw, but at least he had stopped talking. 

"I don't know what you expect me to do," said Bruce. He cleared his throat. "I'm doing all I can."

"Amazing though this undoubtedly will be," Tony began, and clicked his fingers, causing the television to burst into life again, "I didn't fix the reactor myself. Couldn't be done. Just because you can't reach a solution yourself doesn't mean there isn't one."

The buzz from the TV filled up the room, warm and brash, invited but over-familiar. Tony had sat back again, thrown himself back a little, kind of - a full stop to mark the end of the discussion. 

We are not the same, Bruce had not said. He had not said it, but he had meant it a little, underneath the words. 

Not the same.

But close enough it scared him sometimes.


End file.
